Student X

@aspirant s9 Sorry for the late reply. Unfortunately I got my straight rejection last week, and I've been waiting since January 6! I did not apply to VSRP, the adviser had the opportunities posted to our career center website but I went through the same procedure. You basically sit for two interviews, one with the academic adviser you're seeking and the other is with the office of admissions. The adviser gets to assess you academically and discuss your research interest on which he'll base the acceptance/rejection of your application. The second interview is more of casual where the office of admissions ask you about yourself, family, hobbies, how did you know about KAUST, why you chose KAUST, etc (typically 10-15 minutes chat)... If you passed both interviews, the secretary of the center you're going to contacts you for more details to proceed with the visa arrangements. You can check the available VSRP topics on their website, or try contacting a faculty member for a potential position. I'm guessing you start by filling the document on their website, but I skipped this step because the professor already contacted our career center for students. They have a very strange admission system, I wonder why?! Hope this helps, best of luck!

Hello, I'm hoping this thread is still alive. I applied to KAUST for Fall 2017-18 (Jan 6,2017), and since then, I haven't heard anything back from them. They didn't schedule any interview with me! Every time I reach out to the admission office, they coldly reply "your application is under-review by the faculty and any updates would be sent to you by email". It's June 29 already, and the semester there starts towards end of August and still nothing so far. I have my bachelor degree in mechanical engineering with control and robotics emphasis, but I applied for the MS/PhD program in Electrical Engineering (Systems). I was previously an undergraduate intern, last Summer, at KAUST with the same adviser I applied to now. He agreed to be my MS/PhD adviser if I got accepted, but this is not listed in my application as it happened later. It's really frustrating and confusing at this point, as I'm in complete void, so please any clues/hints/steps are sincerely appreciated! Regards, Student X